Archives for Development Policy

In the latest turn of events leading to the Maldives’ fiasco of a presidential election, the Supreme Court has trampled on democracy by postponing the Saturday 19 October vote. In previous weeks, the supposedly impartial body had already scrapped the second round of elections (just hours before it was to take place) and overturned the […]

Firstly, let me apologise for the length of this post. I simply couldn’t have written this more concisely. I wanted to start this week’s instalment to say that I thought that various official reactions to the crisis in Lampedusa was funny. However, the more I thought about the situation the less I was able to […]

By Lies Craeynest, Oxfam’s EU climate change expert On Tuesday and Wednesday, EU Environment and Finance Ministers will discuss their common position for this year’s round of UN climate talks in Warsaw, Poland. Ahead of these important meetings, Oxfam coordinated the visit of a group of Bangladeshi UN climate negotiators to Brussels to meet both […]

The atrocities on Nairobi’s Westgate shopping mall with the hostage crisis and the death of tens of people cannot be considered as a single event, but it has to be encompassed in a wider chain of violence and terrorism that al-Qaeda is exerting through the development of its affiliates in Africa, Southeastern Asia and Middle […]

Today, the report “Trend and projections in Europe 2013” was published by the European Environmental Agency (EEA). It tracks progress towards Europe’s climate and energy targets until 2020. The good news is that Europe’s Member States are on track and will achieve 21% reduction below 1990 levels in 2020 with current climate policies in place. […]

Antananarivo- The European Union has recently allocated a contribution of around 14 billion Ariary ($5.96 million) towards the school-feeding programme implemented by the World Food Programme (WFP) and the Ministry of Education in the southern region of Madagascar. This funding will allow WFP to continue its food assistance which had been in partly scaled back […]

Protests against the Khudoni mega-dam in Georgia are spreading beyond the local communities affected by the dam. by David Chipashvili, cross-posted from the Bankwatch blog We recently reported how local opposition against the Khudoni hydropower plant project in Georgia is being stifled by government figures and how people were intimidated to avoid negative reporting on […]

by Natalia Alonso, Head of Oxfam’s EUs office Today, as part of Oxfam’s on-going Behind the Brands campaign, we are stressing the involvement a few of the leading sugar-based companies have in land-grabbing. Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and Associated British Foods have all been linked to this practice in their supply chain and, given their leading role […]

AEGEE-Europe, together with 10 youth organizations from all over Europe, has launched the campaign YouthRights.NOW for the recognition of specific rights for youth. These youth rights include education and training, employment, housing, health and the right to a healthy environment, participation, sexual and reproductive health, culture and sport, non-discrimination, as wells as proper information on […]

Land expropriation and corruption have been two recurring themes at the Kolubara mine. This week’s arrests indicate that they are closely connected. by Zvezdan Kalmar, cross-posted from the Bankwatch blog Recent developments in Serbia forebode gloomy times for the country’s energy company EPS. After the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development’s confirmation on Friday that […]

The fourth of a six-part daily series by Jan Egeland, Secretary General of NRC, on the reality for Syrian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq. Reposted from http://marhabablog.nrc.no/. At the reception centre in Zaatari refugee camp today I met some new arrivals from Syria. They made the dangerous trip to escape the violence and find a […]

The fourth of a six-part daily series by Jan Egeland, Secretary General of NRC, on the reality for Syrian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq. Reposted from http://marhabablog.nrc.no/. I have arrived in Lebanon where NRC has been active since 2006. This country is currently host to over 700,000 registered Syrian refugees, several hundred thousand other Syrians […]